


The Fitzwilliam Ghost

by rosefox



Category: Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
Genre: Gen, Ghosts, ToT: Monster Mash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2017-11-06
Packaged: 2019-01-25 11:16:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12530100
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosefox/pseuds/rosefox
Summary: When a ghost attempts to haunt Rosings, it goes about as well as you'd expect.





	1. Lady Catherine Receives a Visitor

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fenellaevangela](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fenellaevangela/gifts).



After the third time a knick-knack tipped itself from the sitting room mantel to shatter before the fireplace, Lady Catherine de Bourgh had had quite enough. "Spirit!" she said imperiously. "Show yourself."

She waited. When no spirit appeared, she thumped the arm of her chair. "Show yourself!" she repeated. "This is my house and I will have _no_ unwanted visitors. You have already been so discourteous as to enter into my home without so much as handing your card to my butler, a most shocking abrogation of good manners. I cannot abide being haunted by an entity with such poor ton. Show yourself now or I shall work a proper summoning, confine you in a stick of kindling, and give you to Cook to be burned."

The translucent figure of a young man in a frock coat abashedly manifested before her fireplace. Ghostly water dripped from his hem but vanished before it reached the floor. Lady Catherine gave him a cursory examination. "I see." She sniffed. "No more than a schoolboy. Can you speak?" He shook his head. "I thought not. Well, no matter. You have the look of a Fitzwilliam. That garish ensemble dates to 1740 or so, if I do not miss my mark." The young man nodded, twisting his fingers in the lace at his cuff. "Stop fidgeting!" she snapped. "Mark my words, young Fitzwilliam, if you are to become a fixture of Rosings, which would certainly not be my _first_ choice, then you will comport yourself in a manner befitting your most illustrious heritage." 

She took up the family genealogy, which was always to hand, and paged through it. "Ah. Roger Fitzwilliam, third son of the third Earl of -----, born 1728, deceased 1741 by drowning." She snapped the book shut and fixed the spirit with a piercing look. "I hope you do not suppose yourself to be master in this house by the accident of being my great-uncle." Roger looked alarmed at this suggestion, and shook his head rapidly. "Had you had the good sense to preserve yourself, then I would naturally give you the deference due to any ancestor," Lady Catherine continued. "In your present form, however, it cannot be denied that any such claim has passed well beyond your reach, much as you ought to have passed well beyond this mortal realm. It surpasses understanding that a Fitzwilliam would come to haunt the home of the de Bourghs so long after his date of decease; surely your natural posthumous abode would be ----- Hall. Shockingly poor organization, I must say."

Roger nodded unhappily.

"Nothing to be done for it. Do stand up straight." He did his best to straighten. "And cease that dripping at once. You are hardly fit to haunt my stables." She raised her lorgnette and peered at him. "Very well. As you are given into my care by the Power above, I suppose I must undertake the portions of your upbringing of which your demise left you bereft. The hour grows late, so we shall begin tomorrow after breakfast—at which you are not expected, as I have no wish to hire new staff after the present ones are frightened away by your appearance. To which end, do remove yourself from view again. I will not have you alarming Liza when she comes in to bank the fire."

Roger, slightly dazed, slowly faded away. Only the shards of china on the hearthstones remained.

Lady Catherine clucked at the mess, rang for the maid, and rose from her chair with alacrity; the encounter had delayed her several minutes past her usual hour of retiring. When she reached the door, she paused. "Good evening," she said to the empty room.


	2. Colonel Fitzwilliam Assists a Relative

"Before you depart, dear nephew," Lady Catherine said, "I must ensure you take possession of a small item that should be returned to ----- Hall. I do not expect to visit my brother before the summer, and although this errand is not precisely urgent, it would be best were it executed without unneeded delay."

"I will gladly," said Colonel Fitzwilliam. "Is it an heirloom of some sort?"

"Of some sort," Lady Catherine said opaquely. She took an enameled snuff-box from the mantel and placed it in his hand. "To properly complete this task, keep the box upon your person at all times, and open it only within the confines of ----- Hall. I may not say more."

"Aunt, these riddles are most unlike you!" cried Colonel Fitzwilliam, greatly perplexed. "But naturally I will do as you instruct."

Colonel Fitzwilliam undertook the journey to ----- Hall in a leisurely fashion, stopping in to visit several friends along the way. When he arrived he was greeted with much joy by the Earl of ----- and obliged to spend some hours recounting all his recent adventures. Thus it was not until the following morning, as he was dressing to take a ride about the grounds, that he remembered the snuff-box. Withdrawing it from his pocket, he examined it curiously. It seemed entirely ordinary and of no special importance.

He opened the lid.

For a long moment nothing happened. Then a wisp eddied from the box and grew into the spectral figure of a young man whose face bore a wary yet relieved expression. Colonel Fitzwilliam recognized the look, as it had often graced his own features upon escape from Rosings.

The ghost took in his surroundings and appeared greatly delighted. He bowed to his rescuer several times and then vanished into the shadows of the bed-hangings. Colonel Fitzwilliam was nonplussed. But he was a practical man, and when the spirit did not reappear, he pulled on his boots and departed for the stables. When he returned, he thought, he would write to Lady Catherine and inform her of the successful completion of his errand—and of his own facility with the second sight, which, it appeared, was a Fitzwilliam family trait.

Upon his next visit to Rosings, he determined to peruse the library more carefully. Good grimoires were hard to come by, and he was certain Lady Catherine would have the very finest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So many people felt bad for poor Roger the ghost that I had to rescue him from Rosings.


End file.
